


A Night for Truth

by lostintheverse



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Adam Parrish Loves Ronan Lynch, Canon Compliant, M/M, POV Adam Parrish, POV Ronan Lynch, Ronan Lynch Loves Adam Parrish, Ronan Lynch Loves Adam Parrish's Hands
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 08:54:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20306803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostintheverse/pseuds/lostintheverse
Summary: An alternating POV first person retelling of chapters 33, 36, and 39 of The Raven King (i.e. when Adam & Ronan get together).





	A Night for Truth

Chapter 33

RONAN

I go looking for Adam because he went hunting for aluminum foil a while ago and never came back, and I’m a little fascinated by this. Probably because I’m fascinated by everything Adam does. 

He’s sitting on my bed. Normally my room is off-limits, both here and at Monmouth Manufacturing, but it’s never been to Adam. We never talked about it. It was just a thing that we both knew. 

He’s staring at that silly car I dreamed up when I was a kid. The one that plays a tune. He’s so absorbed in whatever he’s thinking, he doesn’t know I’m here. So I watch him. 

Watching Adam when he doesn’t know I’m watching has become one of the things that defines me. He has no idea.

Or I don’t know...maybe he does. Lately, every time I’m watching him, he’ll lift his eyes and meet mine. Or I’ll glance over at him in that way I’ve done since the first time he appeared in my life, and he’s already watching me. Either way, it makes my heart rate pick up, my breaths come short. His beauty haunts me. 

And not just his physical beauty, though that would be enough. His features are so delicate, his face chiseled. His hands are works of art. But no, it’s not his physical beauty that makes me feel like I’m falling into a well full of light. It’s what’s inside him. His fierce determination, his unwavering brilliance, his kindness, his stubborn resistance to pity. 

No, it’s not even that. It’s something deeper and indefinable. It’s just him. His Adam-ness. That’s what brings me to my knees. 

I lean against the doorframe and watch him and wait for him to look up and meet my eyes, but it doesn’t happen, and that makes this moment different. So I rap my fingers on the door, because I don’t want to startle him, and then I go sit next to him. His closeness makes me giddy, as always. 

I reach out my hand for the car, and when he places it gently there his fingertips brush my palm the tiniest bit, sending shivers up my arm as though the touch was electric. I look at the car, remembering the day I awoke with it. How excited I was. I was eight years old, and it was my dream-toy (literally). Even then I was fascinated by cars. They were complex and simple, all at once. Powerful, but breakable. Lovely, but cold. 

I can feel his eyes on me. He’s watching me just like I’ve watched him so many countless times, and suddenly I know it’s time. I’ve been harboring this secret for so long, holding it so close to my chest that no one could possibly guess the truth. But he has guessed. I know this. He knows I know it. He knows I love him, and he’s sitting on my bed, watching me look at this thing I made, and I feel like it’s now or never.

My heart is pounding in my ears. I’m trembling because I know what I’m about to do is going to change everything, I’m just not sure how. But if there’s one thing the past year has taught me, it’s that everything changes anyway. I may as well take the risk and see what it brings, because I think - maybe - it could bring a miracle more glorious than anything I’ve ever dreamed. There’s something in the way he looks at me these days that feels like a mirror.

Or it could bring about my utter destruction. But destruction is inevitable, so it’s nothing to fear.

And anyway, I can’t take this anymore. I’ve kept my secret too long. There are many painful things I could endure forever, but loving Adam in silence is not one of them.

So I exhale, slowly, and I place the car on the bedside table, and I kiss him.

It’s the first time I’ve ever kissed anyone, at least like this, and it’s undoing me. His lips are softer than I dared imagine. Softer, and warmer, and...responsive. He’s kissing me back. 

Holy shit. He’s fucking kissing me back.

I pull back for a second - or, rather, I hesitate. It’s not pulling back, exactly; it’s more like taking a breath, allowing a moment of space for him to process, to decide how he wants to proceed. This is a turning point for us, and I’m not going to rush him into it, whatever the outcome may be. But that moment of pause is all it is - a moment - and then we’re kissing again. It’s not that I kiss him again, or that he kisses me. We just kiss. Together. 

This is the most incredible thing I’ve ever experienced. 

And I need to stop it. I’m a breath away from pushing him on his back and slipping my hands into his hair and my tongue into his mouth, and that’s not what I’m trying to do. Not right now. Because I need to give him space. Because this - whatever this is - it’s going to change everything, and it can’t be done quickly, or lightly. There’s a heaviness to this, as if it’s the most important moment of my life. And I think it might be. 

So I pull back, but I keep my eyes closed for a minute and just relive it again and again, and I pray when I open my eyes he’s not staring at me in anger, or hurt, or confusion.

I open my eyes. 

He’s staring at me in wonder.

I don’t know what he’s thinking, but his gaze feels...good. So I stand without looking away from him, and he doesn’t look away from me, either, and I know he knows how much weight this moment holds. 

And then I find my voice and say, “I’m gonna go downstairs,” and then I leave him sitting on my bed. I feel his gaze on me as I walk out of the room. Not once has he looked away.

  
  


ADAM

I saw that coming for miles. And I didn’t do a thing to stop it.

Just like that rainstorm that day when I was a kid. I literally watched it roll in. I watched the sheet of rain approaching, and I just stood there waiting for it, waiting to get drenched. Just like I’ve been standing here watching Ronan, and understanding that he wanted me, for...weeks? Months? How long? I don’t even know. It wasn’t conscious. But it was real, nonetheless. I mean, I could tell he was into me. I didn’t understand it, because how could anyone as breathtaking as Ronan Lynch want me? It made me feel good, to be honest, because I didn’t feel worthy of his feelings. But I could see them there anyway. He didn’t care that I didn’t feel worthy. He was just being Ronan.

And I knew if I didn’t do something, say something, drop a hint to put him off, he’d kiss me. I didn’t know it-know it, in my brain. But I knew it in my heart. In my body. 

I didn’t try to stop it because...why? That’s what I need to figure out. Ronan just left. He just kissed me, and I kissed him back, and then he stood up and left the room and I need to figure out why I kissed him back. Because I know Ronan is not someone to play around with. I know he puts up that front because he is so incredibly, deeply sensitive, and there’s no way I’d ever hurt him. I love him too much. He’s my brother.

Is that what it is, though? Brotherly love? Because that kiss ignited things inside me that I hadn’t known were there. Very un-brotherly things. 

I need to talk to Gansey. 

Chapter 36

And so first chance I get, I do. And he’s blustering about not hurting Ronan, and good God Gansey, do you think that’s even a possibility on the table? I would never hurt Ronan. 

Gansey can be a first-class dumbass sometimes.

That’s not what I’m asking. That’s not what I’m asking. 

“I’m not going to mess with his head,” I say, and I’m unable to keep the irritation out of my voice. “Why do you think I’m even talking to you?” I’m talking to Gansey because everything is about to change, and he’s part of that everything, and I guess I just need to know he’s okay with it. Or maybe I need him to tell me I’m not crazy. I start to tell him I don’t know how I feel, but I stop. Because this is a night for truth, and it’s not true that I don’t know how I feel. I know. God, I know. 

I know it in every corner of my body. In every thought in my head. In every wave of emotion. I know that when Ronan kissed me, and I kissed him back - when we kissed, together - everything in the world finally made sense. I mean, good lord. He’s  _ Ronan Lynch.  _ He’s a dream come true. (The irony of that assertion doesn’t escape me.) He’s gorgeous and brilliant and rich and brave and tough and terrifying, he’s intimidating and creative and brutal and gentle and thoughtful and generous. He exudes sex, which is a little weird because I’m 99% sure he’d never kissed anyone until a few minutes ago, when he kissed me. The man has got to be a virgin. But he still manages to exude sex, and fire, and passion, and danger, and tenderness, and loyalty, and safety. He’s a walking contradiction. He would give anything for the people he loves (me included), and yet he won’t hesitate to kick someone’s ass if they piss him off. Not us, though. Not the people he’s chosen. He would die before he hurt me, or Gansey, or Noah, or Blue. He would die before he let us be hurt.

I mean, really, he’s the ultimate badass. And for some unfathomable reason, he wants me. 

And I want him back. More than anything in my life, I want him. I think he’s handed me the keys to him, to Ronan, to his heart and his mind and his body, and I’ve never wanted anything as much as I want to just take them and give him my own keys in exchange.

Gansey knows this. Because he’s a first-class dumbass, but he’s also incredibly wise, and he knows his friends. He knows us. 

I thought, when I went to talk to Gansey, that he could shoot me down. He could tell me I don’t love Ronan, that I just want to be loved myself, that I’m not worthy, that I’m an object of pity rather than of desire. And I think I would’ve believed him, because I’m not like him or Ronan or even Blue. They all believe they’re worthy of love. And I know, on an intellectual level, that I am, too, but it’s hard to internalize it after everything. I mean, until I met Gansey and Ronan and Noah (not that I remember meeting Noah, of course), I was completely alone in the world. I mean,  _ completely,  _ utterly, unarguably alone. My own parents resented my existence, for God’s sake.

  
It’s hard to feel worthy of love. It’s hard to feel worthy of Gansey’s and Blue’s and Noah’s and Ronan’s friendship. It’s next to impossible to feel worthy of being wanted, especially by the beautiful badass that is Ronan Lynch.

It’s not Gansey who could shoot me down. It’s myself. And in this span of a few minutes of conversation, that becomes crystal clear. So when all Gansey says is that it’s about being honest with myself, it feels like the ultimate affirmation. I just figured it all out; everything clicked into place, and then Gansey basically told me to trust myself. If kings are truly meant to inspire, to empower, to strengthen...Gansey is truly a king. 

And now I just want him to leave and take our pretty friend with him so I can be alone with Ronan so we can get on with our future. 

  
  
  
  
  
  


  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr at [rareandbeautifulthing](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/rareandbeautifulthing)


End file.
